Capex of Microsoft Cloud and Amazon Web Services

February 1, 2019

The latest Canalys report revealed the Capex (capital spending) of Microsoft Cloud and Amazon Web Services (AWS) in the December quarter of 2018.
AWS has 60 cloud infrastructure locations worldwide, with another 12 under construction in Bahrain, Hong Kong, Italy and South Africa. Amazon’s Capex spend reached $26 billion in 2018, though the rate of growth slowed to 7 percent year on year.

Microsoft’s Capex rose 64 percent to reach $14 billion. Microsoft has 54 cloud regions, with another 10 being launched across Western Europe and Africa.

The investment to build interconnected cloud data centers is huge, and due to the constant pressure to optimize data center operating costs, refresh cycles are shorter as they drive innovation.

The Canalys report said they are currently focusing more on capacity utilization, which will be reflected in their Capex numbers in the first half of 2019. This will impact infrastructure and component suppliers in the short term.